There will be a few baseball obituaries about Davey Lopes written in the coming days, most of them better written than this. Going over the full career of Lopes as it pertains to his playing days would require me talking about his days with the Dodgers, days in which he was part of a hated rivalry between them and the Phillies. Perhaps his most infamous moment as a member of the Dodgers playing against the Phillies came on a play in the 1977 playoffs, where he was incorrectly called safe on a bang-bang
play in the ninth inning of Game 3 of that NLCS.
He was out, but the decision to not bring in a substitute for Greg Luzinski was arguably as critical, but I digress.
Lopes’ real impact with the Phillies came during his coaching career with the team from 2007-2010, where he transformed that team into a terror on the bases. It’s one of the parts of the game that isn’t as noticeable with its impact on the field compared to hitting, pitching or fielding, but it can still be something that takes good team into a different territory. It’s what happened with the Phillies during that time period and Lopes was the conductor.
Being a good coach means you make players better. A lot of times, that might show up on the field right before our eyes. If a hitter that was struggling turns his game around under the tutelage of a new voice, the hitting coach gets the credit. We’ve seen what happens when a pitching coach has his finger on the pulse of a staff when it comes to Caleb Cotham as he has become one of the better pitching coaches in the game. Heck, even Bobby Dickerson has somehow made Alec Bohm into something resembling an average fielder.
It’s those other guys, the infield coaches, outfield coaches, guys like Dickerson, that improvement sometimes isn’t truly seen on pages of data. When it comes to Lopes, his impact on the team’s running game was undeniable. During his tenure with the team, the Phillies were the best baserunning team in baseball. It showed up in the traditional stats like stolen bases, where Lopes’ expertise in analyzing the opposing pitchers made them the most efficient team around (84% success rate). It also showed up in the other things that make baserunners good. Fangraphs tracks different advanced baserunning stats with their publicly available information. The Phillies of 2007-2010 were the best in several of these categories, including wSB (stolen bases and caught stealing runs above average – 43.8), speed score (5.3) and baserunning runs (77.5).
It’s no coincidence that in the years after Lopes left, the team fell to the middle of the pack. His being let go had an impact on the team. Of course, the team during this time had several baserunners that excelled at the skill in Jimmy Rollins, Shane Victorino, Chase Utley and Jayson Werth to name a few. Sometimes, it helps having better clay to mold from, but almost to a man, Lopes was given a lot of credit for helping them improve in an underrated facet of the game.
The Phillies of that time period gave the city its first extended taste of championship baseball in nearly 30 years. It culminated in a world championship in 2008 that saw all parts come together in a glorious run. Lopes was an important part of that team.
Rest in peace, Davey.
